by Eric Griffin
The envoy interrupted these musings. “You fear that they will not put aside their differences, that they will not follow your lead.”
“I fear,” said Polonia, “that we shall bring down upon ourselves the bloodiest internecine war that has ever ravaged the Sabbat.”
“Ah, but you have gone to such great pains to ensure that this does not happen,” the envoy soothed. “Look around you. All is in order. Everything in its proper place.”
The envoy cast an admiring eye over the precise arrangements. It paused, its shadowy hand eclipsing the placecard to Polonia’s left. “Vykos? I do not believe we are familiar with…”
“No, you would not be. A Tzimisce. From the Old Country. She is the special emissary from Cardinal Monçada of Madrid.” Polonia’s tone betrayed his resentment of what many would see as a foreign intrusion in a purely domestic matter.
“Ah, now Monçada, that is a name that I do know. But what interest can the great cardinal have in this undertaking? It has been quite some time since he last turned his attention to these far shores.
Monçada is a dangerous and cunning strategist,” Polonia mused. He toyed absently with a rusted chalice. “It is less than a year now since the newest member of the College of Cardinals secured his office by putting an end to the ravenous Blood Curse. The pestilence had utterly decimated Sabbat packs on both sides of the Atlantic.
“In New York, no fewer than one in every three pack members fell victim—a loss from which we will not soon recover. Madrid was rumored to have been even more savaged by the epidemic, some reports placing the level of attrition as high as three in four.”
“Death by pestilence,” the envoy commented ruefully. “Such a needless and wasteful final emanation.” There was a sudden dank chill in the air, which might have been a sigh.
“Given such desperate odds, some would say that it is no coincidence that Monçada should have been the one to make the critical breakthrough. If he had failed to do so, he and all of his line would certainly be dead and forgotten by now.
“There are those, however,” Polonia’s voice fell to a conspiratorial whisper, “who go so far as to say that Monçada’s discovery was not merely an act of Providence. I have heard it told that it was Monçada’s own agents that engineered the plague in the first place, although for what possible advantage I could not imagine. Not that I would count myself among these rumormongers, you understand.”
Polonia paused significantly before continuing. “At any rate, none would contest the fact that Monçada has set his ambitions very high indeed—and that he is not adverse to resorting to extreme measures to accomplish his ends. It would not be unreasonable to think that he is positioning himself to contend for the regency itself.”
“And what price would be too high to pay for such a lofty prize?” the envoy replied excitedly, borne along by this train of thought. “The lives of a few hand-picked followers? He certainly would not scruple at so meager a cost.”
“It is not the lives of his followers that concern me,” Polonia replied coldly, picking at the nearest of the coffin nails that pierced the arm of his throne. “Merely having forces present at a victory in Atlanta will not bring Monçada a single step closer to the regency.”
“Yes, but…oh, I see. You fear that perhaps it is not only his own followers that he is willing to sacrifice. What, after all, are the lives of a few dozen upstart New World Sabbat to the great cardinal?”
“What worries me more,” Polonia replied, “is that Monçada might be willing to sacrifice all—his followers, his allies, victory in Atlanta itself—for some greater advantage. The cardinal weighs out his gains and losses very carefully, but I cannot see his shadowy scales and I mistrust them greatly.” He pressed on. “How does a victory in Atlanta measure up against the possibility of destabilizing the North American Sabbat? Of weakening the regent’s New World power base? Of depriving her of her nearest allies? It is quite possible that Monçada’s emissary comes not to bolster but to betray our war effort.”
If Polonia had hoped to startle some reaction from his shadowy companion, he was disappointed. The envoy merely nodded, accepting this new information without comment or censure. After a pause, the shade asked somewhat distractedly, “But why would he send a Tzimisce as his representative?”
Polonia had been troubled by this choice of ambassador as well. Monçada was a Lasombra, a shadowmancer like Polonia himself, and the regent, and most of the other highly placed leaders of the Sabbat for that matter. It would have been natural for Monçada to send one of his attendants, a fellow Lasombra, to the gathering.
A Tzimisce was another matter entirely. Although the Tzimisce had always proved steadfastly loyal to the Sabbat and formidable allies to their brethren Lasombra, they made for notoriously poor politicians, negotiators, and councilors. Few would think to stand against a Tzimisce in head-on conflict—for they were fearsome foes, with a flair for inspiring awe and terror. But sending a Tzimisce to represent you in council was paramount to throwing down the gauntlet.
“Perhaps he hopes to strengthen his position and support among the New World Sabbat,” Polonia said. “After fighting side-by-side against the Camarilla, Monçada might well hold up the Siege of Atlanta as an example of how his forces had stood with Borges and myself—up to the waist in the blood of the enemy, or some such romantic notion—while the regent, whose forces were close at hand, could not be bothered to lift a finger to come to our aid.”
“Ah, and if some new cardinal should emerge from the struggle,” the envoy chimed in with honeyed words, “he would naturally be well-disposed toward his new sword-brother.”
“A more pleasant thought, certainly, than the possibility that he might be sending a Tzimisce because no one is more capable of disrupting a fragile peace than a ravening, short-fused, shape-shifting monstrosity.
“I can’t help but feel that Monçada’s involvement bodes ill for our best-laid plans.” Polonia fixed the envoy with a gaze that allowed for no argument. “I will be relying upon you to neutralize this threat.
How may I assist you in this matter?”
Polonia unwrapped a small, tattered piece of cloth. Until recently, it had been a delicate, perfumed silk handkerchief. Now it resembled nothing more than a scrap of hooded mask a leper might use to cover his deformity.
Inside the folds of burlap shone a brilliant glare of silver light. The envoy shrank back instinctively.
Polonia held out his hand, his face half-averted from the newborn star in his palm. Reluctantly, the envoy took the proffered parcel and hastily re wrapped it.
“You will position yourself here.” Polonia pushed himself up and moved one place to his left. His hands rested on the chairback before the place marked Vykos. The frame of the chair seemed to be crafted entirely of gleaming white bones, cracked off sharply at the top. Polonia unheedingly wrapped his hands around the jagged edges. His knuckles showed white with the intensity of his concentration.
“The silver will strike true—even through the barrier that separates the two rooms.” He brought one hand down and around in a leisurely arc and tapped at the empty space where the guest’s throat would be.
“Do not hesitate to strike should I signal you. The touch of the silver will do you no lasting harm. Nothing, certainly, compared to my anger should you fail me.”
“We shall not fail you,” the envoy replied, still holding the deadly parcel at arm’s length.
“You never have done so before. Please send my respects to your lord and master and tell him that Polonia has the honor to remain his good and faithful servant.”
With that, Polonia turned and reached up to touch the corpse, which still swayed gently behind the throne. One brief sideward step and he was back through the barrier and in his own world once again. A world filled with shadow and with moonlight and with the trappings of the grave.
Saturday, 19 June 1999, 11:35 PM
Chandler Room, Omni Hotel at CNN Center
Atlanta,
Georgia
“And another thing. I don’t really care how things are done back in New York. We ain’t in New York. We don’t want to be in New York. And I’m getting just a little bit tired of hearing about New York. If I wanted things to run just like they do in New York, you’d be the first to know.”
Caldwell punctuated each point by jabbing a finger in the face of the man opposite him. He leaned far out over the conference table to do so, as if it were the only thing holding him back from physically assaulting his counterpart. Seeing that his antagonist was losing composure, Caldwell pressed on more aggressively.
“I’d call you up myself. I’d say, ‘Costello! I’ve been thinking. What we really need around here is a little more, you know, New York. Would you mind terribly coming down here to Atlanta and straightening all of us backwards bumpkins out? You will? That’s swell! You’re a regular guy.’
“So in the meantime, why don’t you just take your sorry old mostly dead and starting-to-stink wormy carcass back to LaGuardia, and just park it right there next to your telephone—at the very center of the known universe—and wait for my call, all right?”
Costello fumed. Liquid darkness seeped from his fists, which were balled tightly around the arms of his chair. From over his shoulder, his shadow unfurled silently like a bird of prey and perched menacingly atop his seatback.
“Why, you misbegotten and ungrateful cur,” he began, rising from his seat.
“Gentlemen!” Borges’s voice cut through the building tension. “We are not here to give vent to our differences, but rather to lay them aside. There is important work at hand. Glorious work!”
At his first word, all eyes turned toward Borges. He held their attention, not with his gaze, but with his immaculate and predatory smile. His was the face of an ancient and well-loved mastiff. The upper part of that face was hidden in perpetual shadow. Light could not prevail across the barrier in either direction. Below, however, the lines of cheek and jowl were yet visible, and these clearly showed the wear of passing years. Slowly and not without apparent effort, the Archbishop of Miami rose, gesturing for everyone else to be seated. He trailed one hand along the edge of the table, feeling his way around its circumference. “There will be ample opportunity to demonstrate your prowess upon our common enemies.”
Reluctantly, both Caldwell and Costello settled back into their chairs.
“Yes, that’s better. Sit. Drink. Be of good cheer,” Borges soothed. “We are gathered on the threshold of a glorious victory. Before we have parted company, we will strike a mighty blow—a blow from which neither the Camarilla, nor their Antediluvian puppet masters, shall soon recover.
“However,” Borges raised a cautionary finger, “we are still poised upon that threshold. There can be little doubt of what awaits you beyond the doorway.” He gestured toward the room’s sole exit, but all eyes fell rather upon the corpse of the hanged Toreador youth that swung gently next to it. “This is Camarilla territory, gentlemen. Have no uncertainty as to what fate would befall you if it were you caught on the wrong side of that door.
“The game, gentlemen, is called Blood Siege. The stakes, nothing less than uncontested ownership of the city of Atlanta.”
A howl of enthusiasm went up from a Tzimisce war ghoul seated much further down the table. Perhaps “seated” was not the proper word. The ghoul loomed. The hulking form was easily nine feet tall at the shoulder and gave the impression of being stooped nearly double under its own weight. It shuffled unsettlingly from side to side, giving rise to a sound like a whetstone biting into a pair of shears. The crystal goblets upon the vast conference table trembled and sang slightly in response to each of the beast’s movements.
A very slight man, who looked like no more than a child beside the hulking war machine, craned upwards and spoke to it in hushed tones. The booming reverberations fell silent.
Others around the table made a point of not noticing this timely intervention. In fact, the other Sabbat leaders and councilors maintained a healthy distance from the pair. If the truth were known, their aversion to the towering aberration did not even approach the unease they felt in the presence of its prim, bespectacled companion, the man they called the Little Tailor of Prague.
Two seats on either side of the Tzimisce and his attendant war ghoul remained vacant. No one among the company made the least attempt to conceal a distaste that was rooted in more than mere xenophobia. Only Caldwell was so incautious, however, as to remark upon this fact. “Does that—Christ, I don’t even know what to call it—that thing have to be here? I can’t even think with it sitting right on top of me like this.” He pushed back his chair and made to rise.
The man seated on his left placed a restraining hand on Caldwell’s arm. “Hold your ground, Capitan.” His voice was low, with just a rumbling hint of threat in it.
“Jeez-us H…” Caldwell turned his head away with a snort of disgust. His commander did not release his grip on Caldwell’s forearm until he felt the resistance go out of it. Caldwell, did not, however, pull his chair back up to rejoin the conversation. Instead, he propped first one foot and then the other noisily upon the table, crossing them.
Averros chose to ignore this slight show of defiance. He pitched his voice so that it carried across the entire room. “But my associate raises a good point. We have answered this urgent ‘summons’ to council. Not because we acknowledge that this assembly has any authority to ‘summon’ anyone—because it doesn’t; let’s get that straight from the outset. And not because our esteemed (if conspicuously absent) host, Polonia—and the rest of his New York syndicate—has any jurisdiction here at all, because they don’t. And not because any one of you has any claim upon us, or even any reason to expect our support—because you don’t.
“The Nomad Coalition is here, gentlemen, because the word is out that Atlanta is spoiling for a fight, and you guys don’t have the experience, the firepower, or the balls to carry that fight without us.”
A roar and a riot went up from the gathered Nomad war chiefs rose, and even Caldwell was on his feet. A man to Averros’s left brandished a fist in which danced no fewer than three wicked and vitriolic-looking butterfly knives, each blade as long as the man’s forearm.
The venerable Borges raised a hand for silence and the crowd gradually began to quiet back down enough so that individual voices could be heard once more. Even some of the Nomads seemed inclined to return to the table, gathering whatever chairs remained in serviceable condition after the outburst of exuberance.
It was a new voice that cut through the clamor. “Honorable Borges—” the sound of the woman’s voice had an appreciable effect upon the burgeoning mob. Attention turned toward her. “Honorable Borges, we are pleased to be invited here as a guest of this council. Know that Montreal stands firmly behind the decisions and actions of this assembly. We would further like to express our apologies that the archbishop could not personally be in attendance, but we are confident that you appreciate the weighty demands of his office.”
Encouraged by a gracious nod of acknowledgement from the Archbishop of Miami, the representative from Montreal continued. “We have come at your behest, to offer what good council we might. We have come in good faith and in accordance with the terms set forth by Archbishop Polonia in his invitation. We have come with the clear understanding that there were to be no weapons of any sort allowed within the Council chambers.”
A Tzimisce some distance around the table performed a particularly life-like, if ill-mannered, transformation of its middle finger—a gesture intended, no doubt, to express his opinion of the feasibility of such a ban given the present company. The representative from Montreal pretended not to have observed this commentary.
“Yes, the sound of drawn steel. I heard it quite unmistakably,” Borges mused aloud. “If any here have weapons about their persons,” his Cheshire-cat grin was the only thing visible beneath the cowl of purest shadow, “let him put them aside now.”
Nobody moved.
/> “Hardin…” Averros prompted.
“No way. No fucking way. I’m not giving my blades to some—”
“Do it.”
“No. That’s it. I am out of here. As far as I’m concerned the whole lot of you can just kiss my cold white…”
Averros rose.
Hardin cursed under his breath. “So is this how it’s gonna be?” Hardin tried to push past, but Averros put a hand on his chest.
Hardin’s hands were at his sides, but an unmistakable ring of metal told Averros that they were no longer empty. Hardin spoke very slowly and softly. “Why don’t you do everyone here a favor and just get the hell out of my way?”
“Can’t do that, buddy. Too many packmates have gone to the Final Death so that you can be standing here, mouthing off and making an ass out of yourself. That contract’s been written in blood. Nobody walks out on the Coalition. One in blood, one in body. Now, put the blades on the table.”
“You talk a good game about this Coalition.”
Knives began to flicker open and shut in nervous agitation. “But when it comes to the show…well, we all see how it is, don’t we? It’s all brotherhood and all-for-one crap as long as it’s all going your way. But what happens when they turn up the pressure? What happens when it comes to sticking up for your own?”
All around them, other leaders of the Coalition were getting cautiously to their feet and beginning to form a cordon around the two antagonists. Averros didn’t even glance aside to weigh where the support was lining up. He just smiled and reached out a hand. “The blades.”
Hardin seemed nervous and distracted. He glanced around for encouragement and must have found at least a few friendly faces in the throng. He turned upon Averros with renewed determination.
